US to announce hacking punishments for Russia

The U.S. is close to announcing punishments of Russia for its role in hacking the 2016 U.S. Presidential Election.

The U.S. is close to announcing punishments of Russia for its role in hacking the 2016 U.S. Presidential Election.

It has been reported that the Obama administration is close to announcing multiple measures that will punish Russia for allegedly interfering in the latest American election. Both the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency and Federal Bureau of Investigations concur that Russia had a hand in the hacking of the U.S. election. There are also now disputed claims that Russia intervened in the hopes of electing U.S. President Elect Donald Trump.

According to reports, the details of an official punishment could be announced publicly next week. The sanctions that are likely to be announced by U.S. President Obama may range from diplomatic censure to economic sanctions. More covert elements may include reactionary cyber espionage operations on the part of the U.S. intelligence community. There was an executive order in 2015 that allowed the sitting U.S. President to react to cyber attacks, which have often come from China and Russia. The executive order was widely praised as it pushed the U.S. into the present where modern espionage against national security and economy was concerned. The debate now is how a sitting president can respond to foreign entities to affect the U.S. electoral process.

"The goal here is to make sure that we have as much of the record public or communicated to Congress in a form that would be difficult to simply walk back, " said asenior Obama administration official